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Saints locker room remains positive amid historic losing streak
New Orleans Saints coach Dennis Allen isn't immune to the growing restlessness from a fanbase hoping for change. When he was asked if he's heard the noise, he gestured to the reporters at his weekly press conference as an affirmative.
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METAIRIE, La. -- New Orleans Saints coach Dennis Allen isn't immune to the growing restlessness from a fanbase hoping for change.
Fans recently left a Week 7 home loss to the Denver Broncos in droves. When the Saints lost their sixth straight game on Sunday to the Los Angeles Chargers, #firedennisallen was trending on X.
When he was asked if he's heard the noise, he gestured to the reporters at his weekly press conference as an affirmative.
"With all of you guys? I mean..." he said with a laugh. "It's hard. I understand the frustration, and I get it. We're frustrated here too. But that doesn't change how we have to go about approaching and getting ready for the next game. I don't necessarily blame the fans for being frustrated. They want to win, but everybody in this building wants to win too."
There's frustration to go around for the Saints, who have not lost six games straight since Weeks 6-11 of the 2005 season, which occurred while the Saints were playing at five different venues after being forced away from New Orleans due to Hurricane Katrina.
"Nothing to be said. New territory to be in," Saints defensive end Cameron Jordan, who has been with the team since 2011, wrote on his X account after the 26-8 loss.
If the Saints lose to the Carolina Panthers on Sunday, it will be the first time they've lost seven straight games since the 1999 season. Both of those years, in which the teams finished 3-13, resulted in the head coach being fired after the season. New Orleans insists that the frustration hasn't turned into apathy.
"This is a tough ass business that we're in. When you lose games like that, it's hard. A lot of guys, it hits everybody pretty hard," Allen said. "I think look, this is the time for the leaders, coaches, players, for those guys to step out front and be out front and lead and that's what we'll do."
Only a few people around the current locker room have experienced a similar losing streak, among them Allen, who was fired as coach of the Las Vegas Raiders after they started 0-4 in 2014. Saints quarterback Derek Carr was a rookie on that same team, which lost its first 10 games before finishing 3-13. Saints linebacker Demario Davis was on a New York Jets team that lost eight straight games en route to a 4-12 record that same season.
Carr and Davis are two of the players that Allen recently turned to with questions on the pulse of the locker room.
Allen meets with the team captains periodically and has dinner with them monthly. He gathered that group, which consists of Carr, Davis, Jordan, Taysom Hill, Erik McCoy, J.T. Gray and Zach Wood, and checked in with them on Tuesday night.
Allen said the meeting was "positive."
"All those guys were upbeat and encouraged and so I don't have challenges with where we're at in terms of our team, our locker room. I don't like the record and I think we need to play better, but any of those other things I don't have a lot of concerns about," Allen said.
Carr said that the captains told Allen the locker room was "good," even though it's a difficult situation.
"Did we put ourselves in certain situations that's tough? Absolutely. We did that. Injuries, all that, none of it matters. We're in that position," Carr said. "Where are we right now? I say we're in a pivotal place, right? We gotta win. ... But we're also in a good place mentally. Our locker room, the mentality, the way guys are flying around at practice, because I've been around it, man, where it goes the other way and practice just feels dull, feels dead. You try and motivate a guy, he won't do it. ... I've seen it, you know? That was not the case with our team today."
The Saints have been trying to examine the reasons behind their recent freefall. The Saints were third in the league with an average of 405.5 yards per game for the first two weeks but have averaged 29th in total offense (290.8 yards per game) in their six-game losing streak. They were 7th in total defense in the first two games (273 yards per game) but have been last during the skid, allowing 432.7 yards per game.
New Orleans general manager Mickey Loomis recently told WWL-AM Radio that injuries have played a major part, even though Hill, linebacker Pete Werner, wide receiver Chris Olave and guard Cesar Ruiz returned to play last week.
"Whenever you have results that don't match your expectations, you have to look at the underlying reasons why, right?" Loomis asked on Tuesday. "We have answers for a lot of things. We have answers when we have players get hurt ... when you lose your quarterback for a couple of games. I don't know that we have answers when you have an avalanche of injuries and you lose your quarterback for that period of time. That's just difficult and we haven't been able to overcome that."
Allen mentioned penalties as one of the reasons behind the Chargers loss. The team had seven penalties for 66 yards, six of which went against the offense. He said they were particularly difficult to overcome with young quarterbacks Spencer Rattler and Jake Haener subbing in for Carr, who missed three games due to injury. He is expected to play against the Panthers.
But running back Alvin Kamara cited a lack of attention to detail on Sunday, saying the last six weeks feels like "a little bit of the same story."
"I don't think we're a team that's very committed to detail right now, execution. I don't think we have pride in those things, the details or the execution. 'Cause if you would, then we wouldn't have so many other ailments that we have right now," Kamara said. "We got a lot of pre-snap penalties. We got a lot of bad going on. ... Those little details is what wins games and loses games in the NFL. And when you don't do those little details well, it, becomes very, very glaring and, and it, and the results become deserved."
Saints tight end Foster Moreau said after the Los Angeles loss that there needs to be a "serious sense of urgency," and that involves every player in the locker room.
"It comes down to every personal man's integrity, what you're doing when no one's watching, the individual choices you're making when you don't have to be on," Moreau said on Sunday. "Are the decisions we're making ones that benefit the team or take away from it? I've been saying that all year. It's been a huge, huge mantra I've tried to preach. It needs to be echoed now more than ever. Personal integrity and accountability of knowing your role, cold, every time you walk out on the field on Sunday."